Underground

“That’s it,” I said, pulling my cell phone off my belt. “I’m calling the cops.”

Quinton clamped his hand over mine. He was sweating, though I didn’t know how anyone could in that cold air. “No! Not now. Please.”

I shook his hand off mine and gaped at him. “Why the hell not? That’s a dead body—a dead person—in there—”

“He’s not the first!”

Damn it, I thought. I clipped my phone back on my belt and crossed my arms over my chest, glaring at him. It seemed like a better idea than screaming and trying to run away. I had trusted Quinton with secrets and lives—including mine—but I realized then that I knew very little about him. And now he was showing me bodies in tu

“Just give me a chance to get out of sight,” he said. “I don’t want the cops to know I’m co

“Co

He looked around, but no one was coming out of the station to investigate us, nor was anyone stopping on the icy sidewalk above us. Any pedestrians were too anxious to get out of the cold to pause and look down at the gravel by the tu

“Yeah. They never found the guy it came from. So?”

“Something nasty is happening and I’m afraid they’ll co

“Why? You wanted me to see this, but you don’t want it reported. What kind of co

“I don’t know what’s going on, but I want it to stop and I don’t want the cops digging around in the underground over this—or at least not digging around me.”

“If you think someone is killing bums, that has to be reported to the police. That’s what they do—find the people who prey on other people.”

“What if it’s not a person?”

“What?” I demanded, feeling colder inside than out.

Quinton started to reply, but my phone burred and cut him off. I swore and snatched it from my belt, glaring at Quinton and pointing at him with my other hand. “Hold that thought.”

I flipped the phone open and answered it.

“Hey, Harper, its Will. You ready for lunch?”

“Will?” Crap. I sneaked a look at my watch. It was eight minutes past two. “I’m at the train station—”

“I’m just outside Zeitgeist. I’ll walk down there.”

“No!” But he’d hung up already. Zeitgeist Coffee was two blocks from the tu

With Will’s long stride, it wouldn’t take five minutes for him to reach the train station. He’d spot us on the gravel as soon as he came around the corner.

And he’d spot the arm.

I jammed the phone into my coat pocket with stiff hands and looked at Quinton.

“We have a problem if you don’t want the cops all over this. I have to run into the station. You stay here and block the view so no one sees that arm. I’ll be right back and we’ll pick up where we left off. Don’t ditch me. If I have to hunt you down to get the rest of this story, you won’t like it.”

He nodded and shuffled closer to the arm as I scuffed back through the gravel to the station as fast as I could.

Will was just coming into the rotunda as I trotted across the main floor. He caught me by the shoulders as I reached him and frowned at me.

“Harper, you’re limping. Are you OK?”

“I had to take a look at something down here and the ground’s pretty rough. I lost track of time. I’m sorry.” Apologies don’t come easy and it must have sounded as strange to Will as it did to me.

His frown remained as he stared into my face. “You’re skipping out on lunch, aren’t you?”

I pulled in a slow breath. “I have to wait for the police.”

He blinked. “Why? What’s happened?”

“I can’t tell you yet. I have to talk to them first. I’ll call you when I’m done and we can do di

“I can wait with you.”

“No—” I stopped myself. If I just told him to go, he’d get balky. “It may take quite a while. It’s going to be ugly work and I know you don’t like this kind of thing. I’d be happier if you didn’t waste your day hanging around here.”

“How long will it take, this mysterious, ugly thing?”

“I don’t know. If it’s quick, then that’s great, but I just don’t know.”

Will sighed. Déjá vu. Just like our first date, with me ru

My turn to sigh. “Yes. I know. You wish I did something else.”

“No. No, I just wish—” He stopped and shook his head. “Di

“Fine” it obviously wasn’t, but I’d have to deal with that later. Severed limbs and Grey holes in concrete walls had a higher priority to me than Will’s sense of betrayal over a missed lunch. Dating sucked.

“Thank you, Will.” I locked my arms around him as he started to turn away and pulled him down for a kiss. “I’ll make it up to you. I promise.” I felt like I was kissing ice that only started to warm up and flow at the end. Then he stepped back and walked off, giving me a quick wave and a thin smile as he went.

My shoulders slumped and an unpleasant pricking of tears started behind my eyes.

I growled at myself. “Don’t be a jackass.” I straightened up and hurried back to the tu

Quinton was crouching near the arm, facing away from it. He was tense and the Grey gathered around him in clinging sulfur-colored ropes. His expression was an anxious frown as he watched me return.

“So?” he asked, straightening up.

“I am going to call the police, but if you explain this to me, I may keep you out of it. Tell me why you don’t want the cops to know about you and what your co

He drew a couple of long, deep breaths before he began, the tension in his face easing.

“I know him—knew him. There’ve been several deaths down here since the weather got crazy. They’ve all been homeless, street people, undergrounders like that guy in the tu

“Fugitive?” I asked. I had to wonder who I’d gotten hooked up with.

“Kind of. Fugitive by conscience, you could say. Certain government people don’t like me and I don’t want them to find me now, but I don’t want to see more of this stuff. Dead people in alleys and sewers and in the subterranean places. I want to cover my ass, but… not at that cost. Most of the deaths have been written off as accidents—just old drunks and nutcases who didn’t come in out of the cold and died of exposure. I don’t think they’ve co

All the things I saw looked like that guy—bitten on. Chewed. With the bodies, the cops said it was dogs, but you saw that guy’s leg—that’s no dog bite. The leg in the construction site was the same way. Something is eating these people.”